Video released since July 5 confirms that a British-French Storm Shadow cruise missile has been captured largely intact by Russian forces in Ukraine. The air-launched missiles have been supplied to Ukraine by the United Kingdom since May and have been integrated into the country’s systems. The fleet of Soviet-built Su-24M strike fighters enabled them to attack targets deeper behind Russian lines. The subsonic missile has been lauded for its stealth capabilities, precise satellite guidance and precision strike capabilities, and makes extensive use of U.S. components and technology. Several European members of NATO rely heavily on it for airstrikes, and most of the airstrikes in Syria in 2018 were carried out using the Storm Shadow. Capturing Shadow of the Storm will provide further opportunities to study Western cruise missile technology and develop appropriate countermeasures after Russia reportedly used its electronic warfare capabilities to shoot down U.S. Tomahawk cruise missiles in Syria, which were then sent to Russia for research . This information is very useful not only to Russia, but also to several security partners who also perceive the threat of potential attacks from European countries such as China, North Korea, Belarus, and Algeria. It is presumed that electronic warfare is also being used to shoot down missiles, and if this is the case, the techniques employed may be studied in detail.
The Storm Shadow missile was seized by Russian servicemen of the Tsar Wolf unit, and state media confirmed on July 7 that it had been handed over to experts for inspection. Dmitry Rogozin, head of the Tsarwolves Military and Technical Center, said of the capture: “I’m glad our troops did it. Now our air defenses will shoot this thing down, and it will gradually become invisible. Useless … the missile is on the battlefield, our technicians disassembled it into several parts, the HE shell and the shaped charge part are separated, the control unit is separated, and the wings are folded for convenience transport.” He added that while it took us two days to dismantle the missile, the process was particularly dangerous because “there was a functioning GPS tracker there that could guide the strike team to the adversary. Even if we stopped it , our fighter jets had to relocate all the missiles as well.” At the time, there was even a fight — enemy sabotage and reconnaissance forces tried to seize the rocket-laden car and an accompanying vehicle on the road. This suggests that preventing missiles from entering Russia is a specific objective of enemy forces, which include a large number of British active duty personnel and military volunteers.
The Storm Shadow is designed with a focus on long-range engagement, which is especially important for European nations that lack stealth-capable fifth-generation fighters. Otherwise, older fourth-generation aircraft such as the Eurofighter or Su-24M would be very vulnerable if engaging a heavily defended target at close range. The missiles navigate using GPS/INS and terrain reference, and rely on a high-resolution imaging infrared seeker with automatic target recognition in their terminal phase. The Storm Shadow is not only used in aviation, but also equipped warships, such as the MdCN variant used by the French Navy when it attacked Syrian government forces in 2018. Although Russia has developed a fifth-generation fighter jet, progress has been severely delayed, and India is also focusing on deploying air-launched cruise missiles with stealth capabilities, such as the Kh-101 and Kh-59MK2, due to the limited number of deployments.